Saturday, 6 November 2010

So, the glass and ceramics course had an overnight trip to Helsinki which Leigh and I embarked on last Thursday. Setting off an another 6am start, we stopped off at many locations on the way - including the Nuutajärvi Glass Village, the Finnish Glass Museum, the Iittala factory & outlet, and many smaller glass studios and workshops. It was really interesting to see the process of glassware manufacture on both a handmade and commercial scale.

After spending the night in a very fancy hotel (breakfast & sauna included!) we were taken to the Arabia factory - an Iittala-owned company renowned for its production of Finnish ceramics. Here we were shown the various stages of manufacture; from making the clay itself, to moulding, firing, glazing and finishing the products.

It was a real insight to see 'behind the scenes' of the factory set-ups and really appreciate how many different processes each item has to undergo to be ready for sale. Definitely interesting from a design point of view!